Pallets have been used for many years as a supporting surface for a wide variety of goods that are packaged in separate small units. Each pallet serves to support several small unit packages that may be strapped to the pallet to form a large transportable unit for loading into a truck, a train, a ship, an airplane or the like. Generally pallets have been made of wood pieces nailed together so that a fork lift truck can lift a pallet on the fork and move it from place to place. Wooden pallets are heavy, easily broken, and not nestable; and accordingly there have been many efforts made to design plastic molded pallets which can serve the same purposes as the wooden pallets and do so with less problems and more convenience. In some instances the pallets have been made to be interlocking such that a pallet on top of one load will nest with a pallet on the bottom of the next load for the purpose of making a more stable stack of loaded pallets. In other instances pallets have been made nestable so as to save space when shipping empty pallets. In still other instances pallets have been designed so as to be nestable when oriented in one direction and nonnestable when oriented in another direction. Such combinations of nestable and stackable or nonnestable trays or large open top containers are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,916,239; 2,973,931; 3,702,100; 3,590,751; and 3,964,400. Insofar as is known such selective stackable and nestable features, as well as other features herein, are not found in pallets of the prior art.
It is an object of this invention to provide a novel pallet of molded, foamed, rigid, synthetic plastic which is selectively nestable or stackable. It is another object of this invention to provide a pallet with the selected functions achieved by merely orienting adjoining pallets by rotating them about a vertical axis to provide the desired function. A further object is to provide foamed plastic pallet having enhanced strength characteristics while providing a minimum of weight as well as being selectively nestable and stackable and capable of being dispensed in either horizontal lateral direction from a stack thereof. Still other objects will become apparent from the more detailed description which follows.